THE FRIENDLY ARCTIC 257 



legitimate. The camp sites show heads and other bones that are 

 the remains of animals actually used for food. This can be seen 

 by the fact that the heads have been partly cut up for cooking, 

 some of the horns have been removed to make utensils, the bones 

 have been broken for marrow and many of them gnawed by dogs, 

 and sometimes there is evidence that the bones were pounded up 

 and boiled to secure the last bit of fat from them. 



But in some cases it is only too clear that big herds were 

 wantonly slaughtered. We have found groups of over twenty 

 skeletons lying a few yards from each other. Such a slaugh- 

 tering place has always borne some indication that a small 

 part at least of the meat was used, and still it is not easy to 

 be clear on this point, for the absent brisket bones and ribs, the 

 parts Eskimos prefer for food, are also the parts most easily 

 chewed up by wolves. That the bones of the foreleg, often found 

 at a distance from the rest of the skeleton, were in some cases 

 not found at all, is hardly an indication that an Eskimo carried the 

 forequarters away. The foreleg is not a preferred piece of meat; 

 and again, wolves in devouring a caribou or polar ox will eat the 

 meat away in such fashion that the shoulder-blade comes loose 

 from the body, so that the foreleg bones can be dragged away. 



When Eskimos kill a band of cattle it will depend entirely 

 on circumstances whether they stop beside the kill and remain till 

 the animals have been eaten up, or whether they pass on, taking 

 with them nothing or nothing but fat. We cannot assume that they 

 would by analogy with the early buffalo hunters kill the animals 

 for the tongues. Eskimos may kill for fat or kill for skins or for 

 both combined, but they never kill for the tongues. They may, 

 however, kill for no purpose at all, and leave their victims to be 

 eaten by predatory animals. 



Our wanderings in Banks Island, both this summer and summers 

 following, never disclosed any Eskimo burial place, or any imple- 

 ments or other artifacts that seem to have been deposited with the 

 dead. We did find two or three skulls and some odd bones, though 

 none of these seemed to be the remains of a real burial. Either 

 such burial places as there are escaped us, or else no true burials 

 have been made. It is possible, in other words, that the Eskimos 

 who moved about the island did not have the burial customs of the 

 mainland Eskimos, and left their dead behind, unprotected by 

 stones or otherwise, to be devoured by the first animals that came 

 along. In fact we know that the Eskimos of Coronation Gulf, 

 sometimes, at least, merely wrap the body in skins and leave it on 



